Every day, too many people spend more than half of their waking hours doing work for which they feel no passion. For many people, prying themselves out of bed in the morning and basically sleepwalking through the day becomes the accepted norm. We buy into cynical lines like, “it’s called work for a reason — it’s not supposed to be fun.” So how do we find our passion at work?

The key is looking in the right place, and oddly, the right place is actually not at work. If we want to find our passion in work, we must first find our passion in life. We must examine who we are at the very core of our being, and then discover what excites us and moves us every day. That is the key to finding our passion with work.

So, let’s walk through an example to provide a little more clarity on this issue. Imagine our job is unloading trucks. We don’t even have to define what the product is that we unload. Let’s just say, they’re widgets. So, how can we find passion in this job, day in and day out – unloading widgets? First, we examine our life and determine what we’re passionate about, independent of our work. And let’s say that turns out to be basketball. If dreams really did come true, we’d be playing professional basketball right now. Instead, we’re unloading trucks. It seems like our “passion discrepancy” is quite large here, and perhaps not even resolvable.

But, let’s look a little deeper. Is the game of basketball really where the passion lies? Does dribbling a ball up and down a court truly make you feel alive? Or, is it the passion of winning; the competitive nature of understanding that it’s your craftsmanship versus an opponent’s that ultimately determines the outcome of a game; or the drive towards excellence that outshines your rival? Typically, it’s those attributes that we are passionate about. Basketball is simply the vehicle that allows us to live out those passions.

But we realize, we’re not that basketball player in our job. We unload trucks. So, what do we do? We bring the attributes of basketball that we’re passionate about, to our work. Competition and excellence are really what drives our passion, and once we see this, once this is understood, we are no longer bound by the game itself. Whatever we do, if we bring our level of competitiveness and drive towards excellence as our approach, then we will have found our passion – even if it’s unloading a truck.

If we want to experience our competitive nature, we unload a truck faster and more efficiently than any one else doing this job. There will never be a day when another teammate unloads more widgets than us. We become so skilled, and so proficient in our unloading capabilities, that we become the best. We become untouchable in terms of our skill at unloading a truck. The same passion that came forth in the game of basketball, has now found a home in our work.

This happened because we came to truly understand what our passion was. This is how we find happiness and excel at our jobs. Every workplace will typically provide a limited range of jobs and tasks. On the surface, it may seem that none of them is suitable for bringing out our passion. But that’s only because we are looking for our job to create the passion, instead of first, finding our passion from our life.

Passion is key to a successful work experience and enjoying how you spend the majority of your waking life. Go find it… and then bring it with you to work. Everyone will benefit.

Kennedy was one of the few politicians (even to this day) who actually talked, not just about the middle class, but about those who lived in poverty, in the wealthiest nation in the world – meaning those who certainly weren’t thinking about which apple variety they were going to try this week; but instead, were just hoping they could enjoy any piece of fruit, which often served as their only meal for the day.

On May 5, 1967, he gave a very poignant and powerful speech in Detroit (video below) addressing the irony of how we as a country measure our success. In case you can’t watch videos at work, below is the portion of his speech that is recorded on the video:

Too much and for too long, we seemed to have surrendered personal excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our Gross National Product, now, is over $800 billion dollars a year, but that Gross National Product – if we judge the United States of America by that – that Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl.

It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. It counts Whitman’s rifle and Speck’s knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.

As we move through our day, fortunate to be surrounded by an abundance of food, it’s important to take the time to remind ourselves that not everyone has the luxury of abundance. And Bobby Kennedy’s words certainly remind us of this irony, especially on a day like today, when the country awaits the new GDP numbers that come out this morning, coincidentally. And if those numbers look good, we mistakenly believe that all is well in the world.

Those of us in the organic and natural foods industry are fortunate to have wonderful and healthy choices when it comes to how we eat. But millions of people in our country do not have the same luxury of such choices. It’s important to remember that we are about ensuring that people have good food to eat, but first and foremost, and to truly be effective in what we do, it’s important to understand that food and regular access to meals is still a luxury for some in our country, and that needs to change. Just as our awareness and leadership with organic foods are changing the way people eat . . . our awareness and leadership can also make a difference in how people are able to access the food they need. This should be no less our calling.

More like Robert Kennedy, please.

In the foreseeable future, organic prices will not suddenly drop to that of their conventional counterparts. That’s just not going to happen. The issue of cost will remain and we need to become experts on addressing this critical issue – providing clear and accurate information to consumers who are looking to make healthy food choices.

So, how can we deal with this number one issue affecting organic sales? In reality, organic food production will always cost more. If we were able to bring it down to conventional costs, it would most likely mean a radical shift in our government policies that we are not likely to see. The change (if it does occur) will come from a universal understanding of choosing the well being of our land and people over profits and convenience, and having a broader understanding of how much our food supply really costs. The truth is that what we call the “high price” of organic food comes a lot closer to the true price of producing that food than we see in any other food delivery system. What makes it difficult for the consumer to see and to understand is that this cost does not immediately register at the checkout line. The other costs are more insidious and are spread out in ways that we’ve simply come to accept, even without understanding them. As Michael Pollan has said:

It’s important to remember that when you buy conventional food, many costs have been shifted — to the taxpayer in the form of crop subsidies, to the farmworker in the form of health problems, and to the environment in the form of water and air pollution.

So it’s possible to make a case to the consumer for the superiority of organic food — but the stronger case is to the citizen. Farming without synthetic pesticides is better for the soil, for the water and for the air — which is to say, for the commons. It is also better for the people who grow and harvest our food, who would much rather not breathe pesticides. Producing meat without antibiotics will also help stave off antibiotic-resistance. If you care about these things, then the premium paid for organic food is money well spent.

And I would add that at some point not caring about these things will have an enormous economic impact, and we as citizens will pick up that tab. It’s a myth to think that because we pay less at the register, conventionally grown foods are less expensive. It’s similar to when we purchase a car. Even if we know why a Mercedes Benz costs more than a Kia Rio at the dealership, it doesn’t mean that suddenly having that information will then make everyone comfortable to purchase the more expensive car. But, if it can be shown that over time, the Mercedes actually costs less than the Kia, then a much more compelling and attractive case has been made. What if it turns out that on average, the Mercedes can last for 18 years and maintain the same engine, while on average the Kia will last for only 6 years; and then factoring in maintenance costs, you discover that over that 18 year period, buying a Mercedes actually saves you $8,500? It then becomes fair and accurate to say that a Mercedes Benz is a more cost effective means of transportation than what was thought to be true with the less expensive, Kia Rio. To stay with this analogy, organic foods really are the Mercedes Benz of our food system. It provides the best value, highest quality product, as well as being the least expensive choice.

We indeed push forward with what can be done to lower organic food prices, all the while realizing that the most critical task is helping people to understand, that in many ways, we are already paying less for organic than conventional food – we just don’t realize it. The success we have with this discussion will play a critical role in the long-term success of organic food.

For those who regularly follow this blog, you have become acquainted with my passion for understanding leadership, and I would rate this 15 minute talk by Simon Sinek as a must see for anyone who wants to improve their own leadership skills or help push their company towards improved leadership practices.

The key is determining why someone would want to follow you, and it must be more than that your name is simply in the right position on the company flow chart. That’s not compelling!

People follow leaders who have a clear vision. People want to know why are we doing what we do? Why should we get excited about coming to work each day? Creating that level of understanding and inspiration is the fundamental job of a leader.

An effective and inspired leader must understand why they are in business. What got us here in the first place? That’s the question to answer. There must have been some inspiring moment, or thought process, or awareness that lead to the initial creation of the business. Find that, celebrate it, embrace it, and you will connect to your role as a leader… and people will gladly follow you.

And the more you share that vision, and the more clearly and simply you can communicate it to your team, the better. And here’s a hint – if the answer to the question of why are we in business has anything to do with money, or profits, or top line sales… you have completely missed the mark. Those who follow are not interested in devoting their lives to what can be viewed on a spreadsheet. Spreadsheets do not excite! They may excite those who create them, but they are not the basis for what motivates and inspires people at work. But people will show amazing passion, excitement and devotion to a vision; a purpose that is fulfilling and can change lives. And once you have inspired people to follow; once you have given them an understanding of your company’s “why”, then amazing things happen, and yes, one of those amazing things is that profits and top line sales improve. Even the spreadsheets are happy.

Find that in your business and make it the why that inspires you and your team to show up everyday. It’ll work; it’ll make your job fun; and you’ll transform lives. Not bad for a days work.

Enjoy the video.

Scientists know that simply reducing our greenhouse gas emissions is not enough; we must also pull carbon out of the atmosphere in the form of CO2. Soil carbon sequestration (soil storage) is the process of moving CO2 from the atmosphere into the soil, where it can no longer contribute to the warming of our planet. In case you’re doing a double take here, you read that last line correctly. Our soil actually grabs carbon out of the atmosphere and brings into the soil, where in addition to reducing the carbon in the atmosphere, it also provides huge benefits to the health of our soil and therefore to our food.

So here’s how it works: Plants pull CO2 out of the atmosphere through photosynthesis, so as plants grow, carbon is captured in their roots. When the plant dies, its roots remain in the soil, serving as a storage unit for carbon. Very simply – this is the process of building healthy soils.

Soil organic matter is approximately 50 percent carbon. As we increase soil carbon, we build soil. Over the past 150 years more than a third of the CO2 we have added to the atmosphere has come from the impact of conventional farming practices – changes in land use and poor land management – not from burning fossil fuels. During this time, we have lost 50-80 percent of our topsoil worldwide. Positive changes in land use could sequester significant amounts of carbon in the soil. Restoring even a portion of the lost carbon in our soils would represent a significant reduction in atmospheric greenhouse gases, an effective tool to curb global warming. And, organic farming is the best method for restoring carbon to our soil.

There’s more carbon in soil than there is in the atmosphere and the global biomass combined. Soil contains about 3 times as much carbon as the atmosphere and 5 times as much as forests. And about 60% of this is in the form of organic matter in the soil, which sounds incredible, but it’s true. Soil subject to organic farming methods sequesters far more carbon than conventionally-farmed soil – this according to just about every scientific study ever published, but specifically according to the Food and Agriculture Association of the United Nations, (FAO). Increasing the amount of carbon naturally stored in soils could provide the short-term bridge to reduce the impacts of increasing carbon emissions until low-carbon and sustainable technologies can be implemented. According to the FAO, 86% of agriculture’s potential for climate change mitigation lies in carbon sequestration in soils; that organic farming results in 20%-28% higher levels of soil carbon compared to non-organic farming; and that a global conversion to organic farming could sequester up to 11% of global greenhouse gas emissions. That’s significant!

And here are a few more key points detailing the importance of soil carbon store and how it impacts climate change:

- Soil carbon losses account for 1/10th of all the CO2 emissions by human activity since 1850. However, unlike the losses from burning fossil fuels, the soil carbon store can be recreated to a substantial extent. This would remove large amounts of previously emitted carbon from the atmosphere, offsetting current greenhouse gas emissions.

- The principal component of the soil carbon store is humus, a very stable form of organic carbon, with an average lifetime of hundreds to thousands of years.

- Soil carbon sequestration also provides a rapid and timely greenhouse gas emission mitigation win since climate sequestration starts as soon as the positive practices (organic farming techniques) are adopted and about half of the total amount that will be sequestered occurs within the first 20 years. This is critically important, as drastic greenhouse gas emission reductions are required in the next 20 years to mitigate the rapidly growing impact of climate change.

Organic farming typically highlights it’s soil advantages including better plant nutrient content, increased water retention capacity, and less soil erosion; but now it’s time to highlight a tremendous attribute of organic farming that often goes unmentioned. It’s time to highlight carbon soil storage as a key benefit to organic farming – and one that may be key to mitigating the impact of climate change . . . and that’s a big deal.

According to the United States Department of Agriculture, the number of slaughterhouses nationwide declined from 1,211 in 1992 to 809 in 2008, while the number of small farmers has increased by 108,000 in the past five years. The issue appears to be infrastructure. Many people who are very knowledgeable on this issue have been saying for years, “it’s not the shortage of food that’s the issue for local eating; it’s the infrastructure”. The New York Times did a nice article about this situation and how it affects local meat production. It’s definitely worth the read. You can also go here for even more information. If we are going to ultimately become a society that relies on local communities for food production, then we must rebuild the local food infrastructure for processing and distribution. This is a huge paradigm shift for a country that reaches 1,500 miles or more for its regular dinner menu.

Animals, plants, and microbes are the consummate engineers. They have found what works, what is appropriate, and most importantly, what lasts here on Earth. Instead of harvesting organisms, or domesticating them to accomplish a function for us, Biomimicry differs from other “bio-approaches” by consulting organisms and ecosystems and applying the underlying design principles to our innovations.

Janine Benyus: Science writer, innovation consultant, conservationist, and self-described nature nerd is one of the most prominent voices on Biomimicry. In her video below she makes a compelling case for reaching out to the genius of the natural world, and how easy it is to explore her magnificent teachings. We simply need to notice. Enjoy… and happy Friday!

Arthur Schopenhauer, an 18th century German philosopher, is not someone who typically shows up when you Google famous thinkers – but he is well known for this wonderful quote – “Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.”

We typically think of genius as someone with an amazingly high IQ; someone who scores 1600 on their SAT’s; but most psychologists will argue that true genius is not necessarily about measured intelligence, it’s more about how we think. A genius tends to know how to think instead of what to think.

Typically, we think reproductively, that is on the basis of similar problems encountered in the past. When confronted with problems, we fixate on something in our past that has worked before. We ask, “What have I been taught in life, education or work on how to solve the problem?” Then we analytically select the most promising approach based on past experiences, excluding all other approaches, and work within a clearly defined direction towards the solution of the problem. Because of the soundness of the steps based on past experiences, we become arrogantly certain of the correctness of our conclusion.

You consider the least obvious as well as the most likely approaches. It is the willingness to explore all approaches that is important, even after one has found a promising one.

Einstein was once asked what the difference was between him and the average person. He said that if you asked the average person to find a needle in the haystack, the person would stop when he or she found a needle. He, on the other hand, would tear through the entire haystack looking for all the possible needles.

If we want to study genius, then we really need to look no further than our children. Designer Tim Brown, CEO of the “innovation and design” firm IDEO travels around the country talking about the powerful relationship between creative thinking and play — making the case that children embody the true spirit of genius; and the more we can re-learn to think like them, the more we will see innovative and creative solutions emerging from the workplace.

The advantage children have is they are not self-conscious. They are not afraid to share ideas because you may think they are silly or irrelevant. They really don’t care what you think about what they think. They simply share their thoughts. It’s beautiful, and it’s perfect… and quite often, it’s genius. For at a very rudimentary level, that’s what defines genius. As adults, it’s our self-consciousness – our need to have our ideas be accepted – that keeps us from tapping into our own genius. We don’t like to be rejected; we like to be taken seriously; and if we share something that may seem too out-of-bounds, too outside the norm, we risk feeling ostracized, and sadly we all lose the benefit of potential genius.

Most meeting environments are inadvertently setup to discourage genius. Quite often meetings need to happen within a very specific timeframe; they need to move briskly; it’s less about exchanging ideas, and more about disseminating information. If we want our workplace, our retail operation, or our department to truly flourish, then we need to encourage genius… and it’s there… it just may not yet be comfortable to shine. And how do we make it comfortable? Create a fun, playful, safe environment for self-expression. Make it incredibly clear that you aren’t just looking for confirmation on your own thinking. You want to be challenged. You want to see a “little crazy”, if you will.

When Steve Jobs believed that computers weren’t just for the workplace, and where they would really find success is in the home, everyone thought he was nuts. Democracy itself was considered ludicrous at first blush… thank you very much Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Franklin, and friends. We need innovation, and we need to encourage it. As our philosopher friend, Arthur Schopenhauer so eloquently wrote – “all truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

More genius please.

RECEIVING: Always check each case of soft fruit upon arrival. There may be varying degrees of ripeness in the fruit and you should not assume that each case is at the same level of ripeness. Even when rotating your previous stock, check the newly arrived fruit to compare to what you already have in back-stock. You don’t want to rotate your product automatically based on the date it came in, but rather based on its level of ripeness. In other words, it is possible that a shipment that arrives on Thursday may not need to be placed on the bottom of the rotation under product that arrived on the previous Tuesday. Check how ripe the fruit is and arrange your back-stock accordingly. Inspecting ripeness levels upon receiving is imperative!

STORAGE: It’s best to store your soft fruit in 34-36 degree temperatures for optimal holding. If you want to accelerate the ripening process, storing it at 60-75 degree temperatures will be best. Check the fruit daily that you are trying to ripen as this process can happen rather quickly.

DISPLAY: These three items (peaches, plums and nectarines) display nicely next to one another. Avoid placing the peaches and nectarines side by side, and if you have a black plum and red plum avoid displaying them next to one another as well. The key to making this display work is to feature the best side of the fruit – particularly true with nectarines and peaches. Typically the part of the fruit that will have the highest color is the side or the bottom. Find the highest color spot on the fruit and display this side facing outward towards the shopper. Putting the best color of the fruit forward can make a huge difference in how your display looks. Taking it one step further and hand-stacking the fruit will give a nice clean and neat appearance that your customers will greatly appreciate. This fruit must be rotated every day! Unlike other cooler weather fruit that can be on a more lenient rotation schedule, these soft fruit varieties should be gone through every day.

SAMPLING: If you are not literally on a mission to make sure that everyone who walks through the door tastes at least one of these fruits, then it’s a missed opportunity. Make sure to have a strong presence on the floor in your department during the summer season and have all of your staff fully engaged and ready for sampling. There is no better way to move your best tasting fruit than to provide samples

To assist you with building excitement around your soft fruit display, Click Here or on the image above to download a promotional poster.

Good luck!

Honeybee pollination plays a role in about one-third of all food and beverages sold in the United States. The California almond crop alone requires 60 percent of all managed colonies devoted to pollination. Honeybees pollinate more than 90 of the flowering crops we have – among them: apples, nuts, avocados, soybeans, asparagus, broccoli, celery, squash and cucumbers, citrus fruit, peaches, kiwi, cherries, blueberries, cranberries, strawberries, cantaloupe and other melons.

About one-third of the human diet comes from insect-pollinated plants, and the honeybee is responsible for 80 percent of that pollination, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Even cattle, which feed on alfalfa, depend on bees.

This honeybee problem extends beyond the borders of the U.S. On Monday, the European Union responded to this report by banning three of the world’s most widely used pesticides (known as neonicotinoids) for two years as a precautionary measure.

In the United States, by contrast, regulators are moving more slowly. In this new Federal report from the Agriculture Department and the Environmental Protection Agency – they argue that there are a wide variety of reasons for the disappearance of U.S. honeybees since 2007 and neonicotinoids are only one possible factor.

U.S regulators will not be taking the same action as Europe and are not yet ready to ban the pesticides in question. Instead, the U.S. is slowly conducting a review of neonicotinoids that is expected to be completed in 5 years.

The link between bee colonies disappearing and pesticides is still being debated (only the degree to which it is having an impact – not whether or not it is actually part of the problem), but Europe, when faced with an uncertain concern that could impact their food supply and the overall environment made the decision to ban neonicotinoids for 2 years, just in case they really are the over-riding culprits in the demise of our bee populations. The United States, on the other hand (with pesticides being a billion dollar industry in the country) have decided to move more slowly.

Quite a contrast, the EU, when faced with this crisis errs on the side of the environment. The United States… not so much – let’s give it 5 more years. Our approach in the U.S. to the environment is exhausting. I’d much prefer if it were exhaustive instead.